Highly acclaimed British tenor Ruairi Bowen is increasingly in demand on both the operatic and concert stage.
Engagements in the 2023 / 2024 season included his debut with English National Opera as Earl Tolloller Iolanthe; First Armed Man Die Zauberflöte with Scottish Chamber Orchestra at Edinburgh International Festival; staged performances of Die Schöpfung at Lithuanian National Opera; Handel’s Messiah at Dubai Opera House, multiple roles in Purcell's The Indian Queen with Le Concert d’Astrée, Cyril Princess Ida with Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Evangelist / Arias St John Passion with Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, J. S. Bach’s Easter Oratorio with Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Lili Boulanger’s Faust et Hélène with Royal Orchestral Society
Engagements during 2024 / 2025 include Damon Acis and Galatea for Opera Holland Park; Thespis – Mercure Platée for National Theatre, Prague; Evangelist / Arias St John Passion with Polyphony & Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Howells’ Hymnus Paradisi with the Philharmonia Orchestra at the Three Choirs Festival.
Ruairi is an established interpreter of Baroque music in the UK and abroad, collaborating with some of the leading conductors in the field including Emmanuelle Haïm, Sir John Eliot Gardiner and Stephen Layton. An experienced Evangelist of Bach's Passions, he has performed at Wigmore Hall, Bachfest Leipzig and Snape Maltings, as well as with numerous choral societies across the UK; he will undertake the role at the annual Good Friday performance of St John Passion at St John’s Smith Square in 2025.
Other concert engagements have included B Minor Mass with Opole Philharmonic Orchestra and Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra; Christmas Oratorio with Britten Sinfonia; Magnificat at Tilford Bach Festival, St John Passion with both the Adelaide and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras, Handel’s Messiah at Händel Festspiele Halle; The Creation with London Mozart Players; and Vaughan Williams’ A Cotswold Romance with the Lebanese Philharmonic Orchestra. He made his debut with the Philharmonia singing Dvorak’s Requiem at the 2022 Three Choirs Festival, returning in 2023 to sing Vaughan Williams Sancta Civitas.
A graduate of King's College, Cambridge, Ruairi Bowen was invited to sing on Proud Songsters, an album of English Solo Song recorded with pianist Simon Lepper, featuring distinguished former members of the world-famous chapel choir. His broadcasts and recordings further include Delius’ Hassan – Complete Incidental Music with Britten Sinfonia on Chandos CD, Percy Grainger’s Brigg Fair and Nathaniel Dett’s Music in the Mine for BBC Radio 3 and Stanford's Mass Via Victrix with the BBC National Orchestra & Chorus of Wales on Lyrita CD.
Growing up in the Welsh Marches, he developed a keen interest in exploring the integrated relationship between poetry and nature through pastoral song with recent highlights including a recital on Innocence & Experience with William Vann, performing Finzi's A Young Man's Exhortation and Tippett’s Boyhood’s End . During the live music hiatus in 2020/21, he was a Support Worker for the Children's Section of the British Refugee Council, and formed part of The Hampstead Collective, an ensemble drawn from the musicians in the resident octet at Hampstead Parish Church, with whom he has performed many of Bach’s sacred works. He continues his studies with John Lattimore and Sam Queen, and plays regularly for Addiscombe Cricket Club in the Surrey Championship.
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